Published: January 05, 2010 05:00 pm

Shopping trips fun back in the day, but not the drive on Route 52

By CHARLES OWENS
Bluefield Daily Telegraph

Growing up in McDowell County as a youngster, the weekly drive to Bluefield — weather permitting of course — was always something I would look forward to.

That’s not to say we wouldn’t shop in McDowell County. Mom probably took us more to Welch than she did to Bluefield. I remember the old G.C. Murphy store in Welch had lots and lots of toys — and plenty of trains in particular. I was just a child back then, but I loved buying toy trains. I had lots and lots of model trains growing up in Anawalt.

However, some of the biggest and best toys at the time could be found at the old Hill’s Department Store in Green Valley. While it meant a long drive to Bluefield (a good hour along Route 52 and another long hour back) it was normally worth the drive because of all of the neat things you could buy at the old Hill’s store.

Later on — as I got a little older — those great toys became video games, and you could buy those at the Mercer Mall as well. I seem to remember that JCPenny of all places sold video games back in the day. I think they even had video game kiosk displays — where you could play games before you bought them. I remember buying (or mom buying) the original “Pac-Man” port for the old Atari 2600 for me at JCPenny. The game was absolutely horrendous — it looked and played nothing like the original arcade Pac-Man. But it didn’t really matter — I thought it was greatest game ever at the time.

Lunch would often be a stop at the old Ponderosa Restaurant across from Hills, or the old Western Sizzlin restaurant in Bluefield. Both had great food at the time, and both are somewhat still missed today. We didn’t go to Princeton very often — as we knew there was still a long ride back home to McDowell County. And even back then the odds were pretty good that you would get stuck behind a coal truck, or timber truck, along Route 52. So the ride home would normally be long — or at least longer than it should have been. Throw in a little snow or ice, and the ride home was treacherous — as it still is today for those who must travel Route 52 during periods of inclement weather.

Later on in life — when I got my own driver’s license — a solo trip to Welch would normally consist of stopping at Magic Mart, the Sterling Drive Inn and, of course, the bowling alley. I never really bowled — mainly I would just hang out at the bowling alley. However, the trips to Welch did hit a bump in the road, so to speak, when I scratched mom’s vehicle while attempting unsuccessfully to navigate a turn around a brick concrete wall at my aunt’s house.

I guess you could call that my first unofficial accident — the brick wall scratched the car. Mom will still remind me today of how I scratched her car while in high school.

It’s too bad we didn’t have a Wal-Mart or a Kmart in McDowell County back then. As a result, you sometimes had to make the drive to Bluefield if there were certain specific items you were looking for — like a newly released, and must-buy, video game. I remember going as far as Roderfield for comic books — as I was a bit of a comic book collector back in high school. Good thing I bought some of those comic books, as a couple of them are worth a little bit of money now.

The college years were quite a transition — as I was making the unofficial move from McDowell to Mercer. Living on campus at Concord, I spent more time obviously in Mercer County than I did in McDowell County. The trip to the Mercer Mall suddenly become a 20 minute or so drive down the road — not a long and treacherous journey down Route 52. Princeton was just a quick spin down the road. It was a nice change.

A lot has changed over the years, but the ride home to McDowell County is still quite a challenge — especially during the winter months and when you have weather like we’ve been experiencing lately. I haven’t really driven Route 52 a lot in recent weeks, but I was reminded of the frustration of driving along the so-called highway that time forgot last week when I had to travel on the road during less than ideal weather conditions.

I guess that’s one of the reasons why we here at the Daily Telegraph are always fighting for the King Coal Highway. We really need a new, modern-four lane interstate corridor to replace Route 52. With a better road, the ride home to McDowell County would be so much simpler and certainly safer.

Charles Owens is the Daily Telegraph’s city editor. Contact him at cowens@bdtonline.com.